Dostoyevsky’s Inquisitor:

The Question of Evil, Suffering and Freedom of Will

In Totalitarian Regimes1

Tine Blom

Introduction

The legend of the Grand Inquisitor is a chapter in Fyordor Dostoyevsky’s The Brothers

Karamazov (Dostoyevsky 1992). The Grand Inquisitor argues against our culture’s most basic

taken-for-granted humanitarian, Christian and democratic values such as human rights,

dignity, freedom and the right to expression and opposition, and he makes a strong case for

the defence of his brutal religious-totalitarian regime. Since its publication in Russia in 1880,

the legend and its inclusion in the novel have disturbed and challenged many of its readers

(Kjetsaa 1985: 347).

Even though it should not be overemphasised, there are some parallels between the time of

the Spanish inquisition in the 16th century and the Russia of the late19th century. Both were

characterized by poor societies and authoritarian political regimes with a growing

underground-opposition and, in both places, religious-philosophical issues such as human

nature, freedom, nihilism and the problem of evil were debated. In such times of poverty,

1 An earlier version of this paper was presented at the seminar Cultures of Marginality:Confessions, Dialogues and Narratives, held on the 17th and 18th of September 2001 in Lillehammer, Norway, and later printed as a college working paper. The seminar was a co-operation between Lillehammer College and the Centre for Urban and Cultural Research (CUCR) at Goldsmiths’ College, the University of London.

1

suffering and oppression, it is understandable that doubts arise about whether there can be a

good almighty God.

Dostoyevsky’s way of responding to the Grand Inquisitor in his novel is not based on

presenting counter-arguments, but upon producing the counter-narrative of Sosima, a monk,

who shows us another way of responding to human suffering. To make sense of this story, the

roles, worldview and confession that take place will be analysed through two main analytical

perspectives. One is rooted in an understanding of political power and institutions and, by

way of contrast, an alternative perspective based upon an a-political emphasis on empathy and

compassion in personal relations will also be employed.

The analysis presented here to some extent risks breaking with Dostoyevsky’s intentions. The

idea is that the thoughts and actions of individuals cannot be fully understood by referring just

to their personal lives and thoughts, or solely as moral-religious speculations, but they should

be seen in relation to the political and institutional context in which they develop and to which

they refer. And these belong to the topics of political science.

The first part of this paper constitutes a short reflection on the use of narratives and counter-

narratives. It is followed by three sections on the main topics developed by the legend. The

first is about the universal human questions of evil, suffering and the price of harmony. The

second is about the role of mysteries, authority and the idea of a perfect world, all seen as

instruments of power and as part of political-religious utopias. The third section is about

human nature and what in the Legend of the Inquisitor is considered to be the contradiction

between happiness and freedom of will.

The next part deals with some theoretical aspects of religious-totalitarian regimes. It starts out

with a discussion of two political thinkers who emphasise that power is marked by inherent

instability. There will be a short presentation of Max Weber’s ideas about values and

legitimacy and of Niccolo Machiavelli’s focus on how strategic power-politics influences

those who take part in it and their use of values to maximise power, followed by a short

comparison between some basic institutional elements of totalitarian regimes and

democracies.

2

The paper then moves to a discussion of Hannah Arendt’s perspective on the relationship

between politics and individual morality. She contrasts strategic and logic-argumentative

behaviour to that of compassion and empathy. Her point is that Dostoyevsky’s Inquisitor is

trapped into a game of power that engenders a way of thinking in which people are reduced to

abstractions. The only possible way out is by love and compassion. This is also the theme in

the counter-narrative about the monk Sosima. The last part of the paper discusses the

Inquisitor’s confession to Jesus, as another way of illustrating the points made above,

followed by a conclusion that wraps up the argument and argues for the kind of politics that is

necessary to fight totalitarianism and fundamentalism.

Dostoyevsky and The Karamasov Brothers

Dostoyevsky (1821-1881) is among the world’s greatest authors, his main works being Crime

and Punishment, The Idiot and The Karamasov Brothers. In his youth, he was part of a group

of intellectuals who wanted to publish forbidden literature on the need for social reform in

Russia. They were caught and sentenced to death, but while on the scaffold, they were

pardoned and sent to Siberia. There, Dostoyevsky spent four years in a prison camp and four

years under hard labour. This marked the end of his active participation in socio-political

movements. Throughout the rest of his life, he watched from the sidelines the omens of the

coming Russian revolution, and wrote about consciousness, thinking and his doubts about the

social modernisation movement of his time.

Dostoyevsky’s years in prison left him with a compassion for society’s outcasts. He gained an

insight into the wider spectre of the human soul and its passions, and a belief in the individual

human being’s ability to develop through personal transformation. Within every individual,

there was a small “sparkle of the spirit of God”. Dostoyevsky himself had gone through “the

purgatory of doubt” and believed in “refinement through suffering”. His Christianity was

neither a naive belief in God nor an abstract morality, nor was it a belief remote from life

(Waage 1984). With the courage of thinking every thought to its end, Dostoyevsky filled his

books with revolutionaries, atheists and criminals voicing heavy and apparently

3

overwhelming arguments against God. This enabled him to reflect upon the spiritual tensions

of his time.

The Brothers Karamasov is a criminal novel, with the murder of father Karamasov as its plot.

There are three brothers – Dmitrij, Ivan and Aljosha, and their stepbrother. Although one of

them did it, should the responsibility be shared? The murder of father Karamazov also

symbolises a cosmological revolt against God. In the Legend, the Grand Inquisitor himself is

a spokesman for this revolt. The legend is introduced in a conversation between the

Karamasov brothers Ivan and Aljosha. Aljosha is a monk and is regarded as Dostoyevsky’s

hero. Ivan is a free spirit, a socialist and a rebel.

On narratives and counternarratives

Narratives contribute to raise consciousness about particular topics. They may be seen as

supra-rational creations of the imagination; sometimes they take the form of pictures of art,

providing a common focus, along with novels, for analysis and discussion. Instead of

responding with precise arguments against the Grand Inquisitor, Dostoyevsky lets Aljosha

answer with the counter narrative of the monk Sosima (Dostoyevsky, F.M. 92 II, p. 5-60).

Sosima represents an alternative ideal, the anti-thesis of the Grand Inquisitor. Suffering

demands other answers to the meaning of life than those given by the Grand Inquisitor.

Sosima’s emphasis is not on the weakness or slave nature of man; instead he draws attention

to the centrality of refinement through suffering, to the fact that suffering can also have a

meaning (Kjetsaa 1985: 351-2). But Sosima did not want to take political responsibility and

did not suggest any political advice. Rather, he taught people how to endure, thereby

protecting their dignity.

A main theme of The Brothers Karamasov is that love and empathy are conditions for the true

comprehension of the meaning of life. Dostoyevsky’s goal is to use this story to tell us about

the conditions for belief and how to awaken belief against all odds. Still, there is a political

dimension to the story. The goal is of a highly questionable character, and believing against

all odds is not sufficient for those who strive for justice.

4

The thoughts and values of the Grand Inquisitor

The themes of the legend include evil, suffering and freedom of thought, along with authority

and political responsibility. The dimension of freedom discussed here is largely about whether

individuals should have the right to decide for themselves what to believe.

On the question of evil, suffering and the price of harmony

Ivan asks Aljosha2: “If God is almighty, why is there so much evil and so much suffering on

earth”. Ivan thinks there is a deep evil and immoral perversion behind the belief that an

almighty good God has created humans. This good God is supposed to have endowed people

with the ability to differentiate between good and evil, and has at the same time promised the

coming of eternal harmony. The ability to choose between good and evil as a prerequisite for

freedom was also confirmed when Jesus only wanted followers of their own free volition. As

long as people are free, they will also be able to choose evil, and thereby cause suffering to

others3.

The central critique of this freedom is that someone has to suffer in order for “the chosen few”

- those that choose the good - to gain salvation. Aljosha explains the Christian idea of the a-

political “refinement through suffering” and forgiveness as a way of gaining harmony. One

thing is to choose one’s own suffering, but quite another thing is to accept the suffering of

others. Ivan says:

“For if we accept this creation of the almighty God, and then we are of course winning the crown of

insight, then everything will come clear to us and we will be refined. This is what I cannot accept. For if

the child’s suffering is needed to fill the sum of sufferings that was needed to buy the truth, then I

declare on forehand that the whole truth is not worth its price.”

He then continues:

2 The quotations from the Legend are taken from the end of chapter 4 and from chapter 5 of the novel (Dostoyevsky 1992, p. 311-35). 3 The German philosopher Immanuel Kant (Kant 1998) disagrees with this in his Groundworks of the Metaphysics of Morals. According to Kant, the free person will always choose the good. Else he is blinded, not free.

5

“I do not want harmony, out of love for mankind, ...I want rather to be left with sufferings that are

unavenged. ...It isn’t God that I don’t accept, it is just the ticket that I most respectfully return to him”.

“That is mutiny”, Aljosha said quietly, his eyes lowered and Ivan continues: “.... I challenge you, reply:

Imagine that you yourself are eradicating the edifice of human fortune with the goal of, at the final,

making people happy, of at least giving them peace and quiet, but in order to do it, it would be

necessary and unavoidable to torture to death only one tiny little creature, the same little child that beat

its breast with its little fist, and on its unavanged tears to found that edifice, would you agree to be the

architect on those conditions, tell me and tell me truly?” No, I would not agree”, Aljosha said quietly.

Aljosha refers to “the One without sin”, to Christ who is the only one who has the right to

judge. But according to Ivan, it is the striving for eternal harmony as such that is destructive

and is by itself the source of evil. Then he tells Aljosha the Legend of the Grand Inquisitor, of

which he himself is the author.

On mysteries, miracles, authority and the perfect world

The legend takes place in Seville in Spain in the 16th century in the time of the counter-

reformation and the inquisition. The Grand Inquisitor is 90 years old, and had on the previous

day burnt one hundred heretics. Jesus returns and performs miracles, like waking a child from

the dead and giving a blind man his sight back. The crowd recognises him, but then the Grand

Inquisitor arrives.

“Behind him at a certain distance follows his surely assistants and servants and the Holy Guard. He

extends his index finger and orders the guards to arrest him. And so, such is his power, so accustomed,

submissive and trembling obedient to him are the people that the crowd immediately parts before the

guards ... instantly, place their hands on Him and march Him away”.

Thereafter, he visits Jesus in prison and convicts him for betraying mankind with his lofty

ideals of human freedom. He makes a strong defence for why mutineers must be executed,

and says “tomorrow I shall find you guilty and burn you at the stake as the most wicked of

heretics...” The Grand Inquisitor then presents his visions of the world and its ideological base

that gives rise to his totalitarian horror regime. He thereafter gives his reasons as to why Jesus

is a threat and a criminal.

He accuses Jesus for denying the three temptations - or better put, “opportunities” - given to

him by the Devil. “You were given warnings and instructions, but you did not obey them - the

6

Great Spirit spoke with you in the wilderness, and we are told in the Scriptures that it tempted

you”. The first temptation was that Jesus was called to show his Godliness by creating a

miracle: he was asked to throw himself from a cliff and trust that God and his angels would

save him. The second temptation was that Jesus was called to produce a mystery: he was

asked to give people what they wanted by changing stones into bread. The third was that Jesus

was called to command authority, to take over political power, opposing Roman rule and

creating his own empire with his own rules. He refused, explaining: “My kingdom is not on

earth”. He did not want unfree slaves that were attracted to a power because of fear.

According to the Grand Inquisitor the only forces capable of making people obey and conquer

their conscience were miracles, mysteries and authority. He accuses Jesus of not having

created enough miracles and for not building, once and for all, an empire according to his own

taste when he had the opportunity. He argues that Jesus’ refusal of political power is also a

denial of responsibility. He says “Had you accepted the world and the purple of Caesar, you

would have founded a universal kingdom and given men universal peace”. In other words,

Jesus had had his chance to create a perfect world and missed it. Therefore, argues the Grand

Inquisitor, he and the Roman Church had to do the job for him, to construct a perfect world.

He thereby argues for the primacy of authority and political power over Jesus’ a-political

teachings.

With the assistance of the Roman Church, the Grand Inquisitor wanted to make a harmonious

and perfect world in keeping with the nature of mankind. As long as people only believe in

miracles, mysteries and authorities, such a world must be based on submission and illusion.

Any opposition that questions the authorities and mysteries will be a threat, both to the

peoples’ illusion-based happiness and to the regime. The Grand Inquisitor does not believe in

God, illusions or happiness, but thinks that this is what is best for people.

On human nature, happiness and freedom of will

That people are unable to rule themselves – and therefore inherently need authority - is an

ancient eastern topic4. Freedom just doesn’t work; neither for individuals nor for those who

hold themselves responsible for their rule.

4 Even Scandinavian Viking-kings were invited to do the job for them.

7

The Grand Inquisitor argues that because most people choose “bread for the body” before

“bread for the spirit”, one must introduce rules to match people’s real nature, rather than seek

to impose unrealistic ideals. Only the strong give priority to “bread of the spirit“. According

to the Grand Inquisitor, people are wretched and miserable slave creatures that want to be

subjected. Jesus’ ideals are destructive because people’s real nature is not spiritual. Jesus

demands utopia, and his ideals are too high for the average human being to live up to.

Therefore, Christianity is for “the chosen few”, only the chosen ones are able to believe in this

way. Since salvation is only for the few, it is unjust. He argues that he has concern for the

weak, those who cannot think and rule for themselves and that his regime is the best, because

it takes away the pain of freedom.

The Grand Inquisitor argues that freedom is unbearable and painful for most people. He says:

“You rejected the only path by which people could have been made happy”. Therefore, he and

his regime will take away the burden of free choice. He scorns Jesus for wanting people to

believe in him on the basis of their own personal conviction, by free volition. He argues that

rebels are never happy and will only cause doubts, uneasiness, confusion and unhappiness.

Therefore, less freedom will create more happiness for the many by freeing them from

responsibility, doubt and the agony of choice. The point the Inquisitor is making is that there

is a contradiction between belief based on individual freedom and equal opportunities for

salvation. He asks what freedom is if their obedience can be bought by bread.

“There is freedom enough for everybody and bread enough, but people’s nature is that they never

understood how to share. Therefore, freedom must be fought for the sake of people’s own happiness.

And when the rebels realise their failure, they will despise and deny God, and this is all that Jesus gets

in return for his suffering for the human free will.”

In this way, the Grand Inquisitor defends his “perfect” political regime and explains why

Jesus must die for the sake of harmony. This defence forms the main content of the confession

in the Legend.

8

Some structural aspects of religious-totalitarian regimes

The concept of totalitarianism originates in modern times (Arendt 1951; Barber 1993: 615).

Dostoyevsky’s Legend was written in the late 19th century in the context of the coming

Russian revolution. The topics are similar: all-encompassing control, the total mobilisation

and co-ordination of citizens’ lives and thoughts through the coercion of terror or seductive

persuasion. Here the concept of totalitarianism refers to regimes that are characterised by

monolithic power structures, hegemony of thought, no freedom of expression or opposition

and rulers who, in order to stay in power, are dependent upon coercion and persuasion.

Spain in the 16th century was dominated by the Pope and the Catholic Church, and they had

the monopoly of interpretation of religious scriptures. The renaissance was the main threat

and was countered by a bloody counter-reformation of which our Grand Inquisitor was a

central and enthusiastic actor and spokesman. The religious leaders in power maintained that

they were the only legitimate interpreters of the Bible. Since the departure of Jesus one and a

half millennium years earlier, the Pope and his priests had placed themselves in God’s

position. They became the almighty and uncontested judges of good and evil, ruling over

people’s consciousness and over their right to live or to die.

Jesus was seen as God’s son and he was therefore superior to the Pope in the religious

hierarchy. As such he was the only one with the power to undermine the legitimacy of the

regime. The scriptures promised that Jesus should return some day, and in this Legend he

does. But when he did, he was treated as an enemy.

Theories of power

The works of the German political scientist Max Weber (1864-1929) and the Italian Niccolo

Machiavelli (1469-1527) are central classics in theories of power. Both of them emphasise

that power also traps the ruler. Because their power-base is always unstable, the rulers are

vulnerable and may never rest in their position. A basic topic for Machiavelli is that you

9

cannot free yourself from power without creating it – as a counterpower – and you cannot

create power without becoming its prisoner (Machiavelli 1998; Ehnmark 1987: 173).

And a similar topic for Weber is that all types of political leadership – no matter their power-

bases (traditional, charismatic, bureaucratic) - are restricted by their various principles of

legitimacy of authority. All rulers are dependent upon some kind of support from their

followers. Power must be organised, sources of power must be renewed over time, and

political rulers have to perform in order to maintain their support (Weber 1990).

The two primary analytical concepts in the Weberian approach are interests, which can be

material or immaterial, and organisational structures, through which groups further their

interests. Power exists within a political order, and this political order may be dissolved – it

will not last forever. Ideology, religion and cultural values are immaterial or ideal interests

that may be used as weapons in political struggle. Ideals may justify behaviour, for example

rulers saying that their authority comes from “the will of God”. But ideals are only useful as

political weapons as long as other people are convinced about them.

Weber considers ideals and values among the primary resources of political action. But ideals

are also a source of vulnerability, restricting the ruler’s room for manoeuvre: the ruler must

live up to his own ideals and promises or else he will lose support. The rulers find themselves

in a structural dilemma between the need for free strategic use of various instruments of

power on one side, and their dependence upon upholding the ideology of the regime, on the

other (Collins 1973: 48ff). The contradiction between secular power and spiritual power is

particularly significant for religious regimes and expressed by the Grand Inquisitor: “Well, we

took the sword of Cesar, and, of course, in taking it rejected You and followed Him” [the

Devil]. When religious people go into politics, they also choose to take part in the worldly

politics of compromises and strategic games.

Machiavelli’s works analyse politics in Italy in the 16th century. In his time, the Pope

considered him a rebel because he portrayed politics only as a secular game. He wrote about

“the new secularised, that measured themselves with God and didn’t give a damn for other

laws than those they had themselves created” (Ehnmark 1987). Ideals are political instruments

only to be judged by their strategic capability of providing support. Machiavelli shows how

the position of rulers depends on their skills in the strategic game played out between rivals

10

(Machiavelli 1998). Here, ideals must be used strategically according to the situation. Other

aspects of the strategic game are the struggle to develop and maintain one’s prestige in a

social structure of hierarchies and changing alliances and the ability to use threats and

successfully spread illusions.

The Grand Inquisitor accords with these power-theories when he admits that religion is

deception and that people are betrayed and given to accept lies. He says: “accept deceit and

falsehood ... so they do not notice whether they are being led.” And, “the only ones to rule

over people are those that are the rulers over their consciousness and hold their bread in his

hands”. The best way of maintaining people’s support is by securing control over people’s

consciousness and by making them economically dependent. But, as mentioned above, he

justifies this by asserting that it is “best for the people”.

In his regime, the base of legitimacy is God, with the Pope as His “deputy” on earth, and the

Grand Inquisitor as the Pope’s “deputy” in Spain. Since Jesus is considered the Son of God,

he is the only one who has a higher position than them, and is therefore their most dangerous

rival. According to the Bible, Jesus is the ultimate commander and judge. The Grand

Inquisitor must justify his dominant position and counter the threat. He argues: “[The

Scriptures were] all told by you to the Pope and so it is now all of it in the Pope’s

possession… You have no right to add anything, no right to return”.

This threat to the monopoly of interpretation may reveal a mistaken interpretation of the Bible

and thereby the corrosion of the institutional legitimacy of the political regime itself. The

Grand Inquisitor says: “You handed over the task to us. You gave your promise, you sealed it

with your word, you gave us the right to bind and choose, and so of course you cannot even

dream of taking that right from us now”. Jesus is a threat because he is above the Grand

Inquisitor in the religious hierarchy and is therefore able to ultimately judge his acts as evil

and undermine his position of superior power.

Theories of institutional structure

The institutional framework of the Grand Inquisitor also contributes to the explanation of his

thoughts and behaviour. In the institutional structures of modern democratic political regimes,

there are several mechanisms that are constructed in order to curb tyrannical rule and restrict

11

the ruler’s ability to misuse power. Examples are arrangements that delay implementation of

orders, making time for discussion, instituting checks and balances in power, through the

separation of juridical, legislative and executive power, and the rule of law. A crucial

institutional mechanism is that the opposition is institutionalised, enabling the promotion of

decision-making based on deliberation (Rasch 2000: 84). Moreover, it makes it possible to

remove rulers without military force. Furthermore, freedom of speech, cultural pluralism and

religious freedom all reduce the possibility of totalitarian hegemony. These institutional

mechanisms also tend to make the political system more flexible and able to adapt to change.

A main characteristic of totalitarian regimes is that there is no real separation of power. The

political, cultural and military powers are merged or closely interdependent, and there are no

effective restrictions on the use of violence other than the normative and strategic calculations

made by individual rulers or ruling groups. Rigidity makes them more vulnerable to threats,

and they tend to respond in a reactionary manner5.

The merger of power leaves no room for political opposition. Power sharing is not an

institutional option, and therefore, opposition is by definition a crime. When the opposition

cannot become legitimate actors of the political system, there is no public space to exchange

views and it will be difficult for them to organise and develop concerted strategies.

Opposition becomes either the sum of the actions of single individuals or must go

underground and take on clandestine and often violent operations.

This is what the Grand Inquisitor notes when he describes his opponents as rebellious

creatures that are too weak to develop a viable alternative and carry through their project and

thereby to contribute to a better world. According to him, they are “feeble mutineers” and

“imperfect trial creatures, who were created as a bad joke”. Therefore, they should be

considered enemies of the Roman Church and fought by any means.

Cultural and religious power is about influencing people’s consciousness. When there is no

open discussion and deliberation, it will be difficult to develop alternative thinking or world-

views within society that are capable of correcting and modifying the hegemony of religion

(Arendt 1996: 63). When rulers depend on a monopoly of interpretation, any alternative

5 This is a central argument in Parsons theory of political systems’ ability to adapt to change (Parsons 1966).

12

interpretation of culture and religion will be a threat and cannot be tolerated. Rival world-

views may reveal the hollowness of the ethos and thereby expose the lack legitimacy of their

institutions. Religious fundamentalism gives in particular no room for compromise. As Ivan

explains: “The Catholics hate the Masons so much because they see them as rivals, a division

of the unity of the idea…”

The Legend shows how the ethos of the religion is an integrated part of the political system.

As a young man, the Grand Inquisitor wanted to create the perfect world, but now he reveals

that this political system is based on raw power, serving no higher ideals than brutality and

self-deception. People follow him either out of fear or because they are fooled by the illusion.

Ivan comments: “and note that it is deceit in the name of the One in whose ideal the old man

had all his life so passionately believed. “ The Grand Inquisitor must uphold the ethos of the

regime, but does no longer believe in it himself. Still, Christianity and the Bible are the main

source of legitimacy. This illusion cannot be revealed without undermining the system. The

institutional structure gives no room for development – either oppression continues or it

breaks down.

Political power and a-political compassion

Dostoyevsky’s Christianity was basically a-political. It does not discriminate between people,

it is based on personal beliefs and relations and has no aspirations for political power. His

Christianity, as expressed by Aljosha and the monk Sosima, tells you to respond to the

suffering of people through personal empathy and compassion. The sign of Jesus’ divinity

was his ability to have compassion with all men as individuals, that is, without lumping them

together into some such entity as one suffering “mankind” (Arendt 1990: 85).

Arendt contrasts the compassion of personal relations with the political style described by

Machiavelli (Arendt 1990: 85-87). She considers politics based on coercion and on dictate

rather than convincing as “pre-political”, something for barbarians (Arendt 1996: 44). For her,

politics goes on in the public sphere, where speech and deliberation are followed by action, in

13

this order. This understanding of politics is further developed by Habermas (Eriksen and

Weigård 1992).

The legend describes a situation dominated by strategic power politics. There, “good” and

“bad” in personal relations are very different from what are “good” and “bad” for political

rulers. Norms and demands of political behaviour are of another order and should not be

judged by the norms of personal relations. Machiavelli explicitly warns against goodness as a

political motive and sees it as strategically foolish and dangerous. If the ruler is “good” and

considerate, his appeal to fear will lose its credibility, and he will lose his position to more

cynical rivals.

Even though goodness may be the sign of personal strength, it is, unless strategically used,

detrimental to political organisation. This is explicitly expressed in the Legend. The Grand

Inquisitor dislikes the fact that Jesus does good things like waking up a dead child. He is

dissatisfied with his teachings. His advice for the relationship between people (to love thy

neighbour as yourself, turn your other cheek, etc.) is not good advice in the context of power

politics.

Arendt argues that there is a manifest relationship between goodness and compassion. She

makes a distinction between compassion and pity. Pity is to be sorry for someone without

being touched in the heart. Compassion is “co-suffering”- to be stricken with the suffering of

someone else, as though it was contagious. One cannot feel compassion - co-suffer - with an

abstract entity like “the people”, only with individuals (Arendt 1990: 85).

Since compassion can only comprehend the particular (singular, individual), it has no notion

of the general (“mankind”, “the masses”) and entails no capacity for generalisation. It does

not concern abstract political concepts such as the masses and groups. In Arendt’s reading,

power politics are not about individuals, but about abstractions like groups, systems and

institutions. Institutions depend on the general and therefore rather crude rules and regulations

that must be independent of personal relations. For this reason, Arendt contends that relations

of compassion are incapable of establishing lasting institutions (Arendt 1990: 86).

This creates a particularly potent dilemma of legitimacy for Christian-political institutions and

political leaders. They are dependent on being associated with Jesus’ demand for compassion

14

and goodness, but are also, like any other political actors, dependent on making strategic

political decisions.

The Grand Inquisitor’s lack of empathy and compassion with the people under his rule is

clearly evident. He has become a power-politician and is trapped in the power-game;

concerned only with power and seeing the people as potential threats. He has de-personalised

the sufferers, lumped them together into an aggregate. For him, intellectual abstractions

sacrifice the individual personalities of people.

The kind of Christianity that Dostoyevsky presents to us is not that of political control and

institutional power, but the individual attitudes of love, compliance and the acceptance of

suffering that is impossible to avoid. Maybe this is his warning to the Russian revolutionaries

in the late 19th century. They are building a revolutionary movement with the aim of

overthrowing the Tsar and his regime. And, however just their cause is, it may well result in a

regime as inhumane and despicable as the one they seek to remove.

This is of course a topic familiar to students of Machiavelli: The power one must create to

counter the oppression tends to trap itself in a strategic game that forces the liberators to take

on the cloaks of their previous oppressors6. The only way to break this vicious circle is to feel

compassion and empathy towards individuals and not abstract entities, such as the people

The confession

Arendt also makes a distinction between reason and passion (Arendt 1990: 86). Talkative and

argumentative interests in the world are entirely alien to compassion. The silence of Jesus to

the Grand Inquisitor’s confession reveals compassion in contrast to pity. Compassion is not

speechless, but its language consists of gestures and expressions of countenance rather than in

words.

6 The impossibility of commanding unrestricted power for the sake of the good and without destroying one’s personal integrity is also the topic of Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings.

15

When the Grand Inquisitor is suffering, Jesus shows compassion with him through a kiss.

Jesus’ silence makes his words fall back on the old man. He ends up realising his actions in

the life he has lived. The confession confronts him both with his own betrayal of the ideals he

once held high, and with the hollowness of his thoughts and values. His argumentative attack

on Jesus is revealed to be nothing but abstractions without empathy.

The argumentation of the Grand Inquisitor is a kind of “logical prison”, a kind of reasoning

closed to everything that is outside the structure of reason and the area of reference. Ivan’s

struggle to find a rational solution to the problem of suffering and evil is a long way from the

deep insight for which Dostoyevsky struggled. That is, it is only by empathy and loving life

that man can grasp the meaning of life. As such, Aljosha or Dostoyevsky’s way of responding

to the Grand Inquisitor is by leading our attention to another dimension of human relations.

Confessions are about speaking one’s mind to a listener without any kind of censorship. This

reveals the values and worldview of one’s life and actions. In return, one expects affirmation

and recognition, and most hopefully, a new start. Speaking to Jesus is politically risky. Jesus

is the Son of God and therefore the consequences of arguing with him are unpredictable.

Since the Grand Inquisitor is dependent upon his reputation and one of his main instruments

of power is fear, he may lose his position as a leader if any signs of weakness are revealed in

public. For this reason he wants their conversations to take place in secrecy.

What the Grand Inquisitor may hope to gain is recognition for his superiority and what were

once his good intentions. To accomplish this, he tries to convince Jesus that he was mistaken

and that he should admit his failure. If he could have achieved this he would have gained

personal recognition for his life project and confirmed the basic values of his regime.

The confession reflects the tensions between different types of roles. In the political system,

he is the prosecutor and the judge and Jesus is the convict. His aim is to secure the self-

understanding that he is a responsible but troubled person who, like Jesus, carries the burden

of humanity. The aim is also to make Jesus plead guilty. In the religious system, he is the

disciple and Jesus is his spiritual master. Jesus does not respond as a convict is supposed to,

that is, to defend himself or accept the trial.

16

The Grand Inquisitor is prepared for any response but silence: acceptance, counter-argument

or condemnation. When Jesus does not respond, he demands a reaction: “Be angry, because I

don’t want your love, because I don’t care about you. We are not with you, we are with Him”

[the Devil]. But he received no counter arguments, only silence. What he gets is a kiss –

suggesting that Jesus feels no anger, fear or regret and that he feels compassion for him. Jesus

showed his position as a spiritual master by not passing judgement upon him.

The roles and the process of the Inquisitor’s confession reflect the structure of his regime. He

finds himself in a system where there is a tension between political instruments and a

religious system of legitimacy. During the confessional process, there is a change from the

first set of political roles to the second set of religious roles. It ends with a sort of personal

transformation through self-recognition, but it is hardly a liberating effect because of his age –

being 90 years old his failure as a religious leader is revealed and that there is little time left to

change. The revelation comes too late for any further self-development. He sticks to his old

ideas. Nevertheless, the disparity between his present state and the personal convictions of his

youth are clearly apparent. The intention had been affirmation, but the outcome was agony.

Conclusion

Jesus was given the opportunity to take the seat of political power and to shape the world and

people in his own image and by doing so, remove evil and suffering. Because his rejection of

this challenge, the Grand Inquisitor criticised him. Unlike Jesus, the Grand Inquisitor did not

accept an unjust world and was prepared to meet the challenge based upon creating his

version of a perfect world.

He argued that Jesus’ failure lay in his insistence in defending people’s free will. Freedom of

will implies the right of the individual to choose what to believe, including not believing in

God and committing evil acts. This is incompatible with religious fundamentalism that

carefully prescribes how people shall live and think. Freedom of will is also incompatible

with a political system where opposition is a crime. Therefore, fundamentalist religious

regimes cannot be democratic.

17

Uncompromising fundamentalist religious or ideological values are incompatible with

pluralist political institutions, and will in the struggle for political power become totalitarian

and oppressive. A regime where the influence over people’s consciousness and the shaping of

their wills are considered necessary instruments of power cannot be based on a positive view

of human nature, value freedom of thought or respect opposition and rivals. The Grand

Inquisitor despised Jesus for what he considered his irresponsibility in insisting on people’s

free will and he also feared his ability to undermine the legitimacy of his regime. Therefore,

he was treated as a heretic and a criminal.

The reasoning and practices of the Grand Inquisitor produced the opposite of a perfect world.

His own political system, idealistic reasoning and lack of empathy with people acted to

constrain and trap him. The institutions and ideals he created for the construction of his

perfect world made him dependent upon instruments of power, and produced the very evil and

suffering that he hoped to eradicate7.

Power structures and roles influence confessional practices. The Grand Inquisitor’s confession

is characterised by two pair of roles, that of the prosecutor and judge encountering the convict

and that of the disciple meeting his spiritual master. The confession starts with the first pair of

roles and ends up with the second.

The narrative effect of the legend is that we are made to feel how false the idealistic, high-

flown phrases of pity sound when they are confronted with compassion and empathy for other

people. These attitudes can never be compensated for by political systems, but the conclusion

here is that some political systems give more room for them than others and are therefore a

better protection against tyrannical rule.

Because it does not discriminate between people, and because it gives no prescriptions for

political action, Dostoyevsky’s Christianity can be considered a-political. According to

Dostoyevsky’s hero Aljosha, enduring life and loving life are two sides of the same coin. The

striving for a super-human utopia has been the source of great misery in the course of human

history. Still, politics should not be given up. Since people will and should always strive for

7 Since the autumn of 2001, there are reasons to doubt there will be a better world when powers claim legitimacy for their use of bombs and destruction by referring to their own god.

18

dignity and a world according to their own liking, they must also strive for power and

counter-power. But if power is not to be destructive, it must be institutionally bounded, shared

and separated.

According to Arendt, politics based on public deliberation among equals is not only a

precondition for personal development; it is also the sign of a vital social and political life.

But there are several structural – institutional preconditions, among them the separation of

powers, the institutionalisation of opposition, rule by law and cultural pluralism.

Coda

I first read the Legend of the Grand Inquisitor in Dostoyevsky’s Brothers Karamazov about

twenty years ago. I was staying in a cottage in Finnmark, during wintertime, close to the

border with the former Soviet Union. That day I had been watching Soviet soldiers standing

in their watchtowers observing the Norwegian border. They looked serious, calm and a bit

bored. I waved at them, but they did not wave back. I was there for fun, they were there

because of an international constellation of superpowers. The legend of the Grand Inquisitor

made a deep impression on me. The topic was the confession of the Grand Inquisitor, where

he makes a strong defence for his anti-humanitarian policies and horrible totalitarian regime.

His way of reasoning was hard to oppose without referring to values that he did not share. I

had had a similar experience with a man I met in Kandahar in Afghanistan. What was so

disturbing was that he seriously believed in his right to kill women who did not behave and

think as he thought they should. There was absolutely nothing that we had in common and, as

a consequence, words and arguments were of no use. To this day I haven’t been able to forget

this man, and this has strengthened my interest in the legend.

19

Bibliography

Arendt, H. (1951) The Origins of Totalitarianism, Harcourt Brace, New York.

Arendt, H. (1990) On Revolution, Penguin Books, London.

Arendt, H. (1996) Vita Activa. Det Virksomme Liv (Vita Activa. The Active Life), Pax Forlag,

Oslo.

Barber, B.R.(1994) "Totalitarianism", in Miller (ed) Blackwell Encyclopedia of Political

Thought, Blackwell Reference, Cambridge.

Collins, R. (1973) "A Comparative Approach to Political Sociology" in Bendix (ed) State and

Society. A Reader in Comparative Political Sociology, University of California Press,

Berkeley.

Dostoyevsky, F. M. (1992) The Brothers Karamazov, Knopf, New York.

Ehnmark, A. (1987) Maktens Hemmeligheter. Et Essay om Machiavelli, (The Secrets of

Power), Aventura Forlag, Gjøvik.

Eriksen, E. O. and Weigård, J. (1992) "Conceptualizing Politics: Strategic or Communicative

Action ?", SPS, 20(3).

Kant, I. (1998) Groundworks of the Metaphysics of Morals, Cambridge University Press,

Cambridge.

Kjetsaa, G. (1985) Fjodor Dostojevski. Biografi, Gyldendal Norsk Forlag, Drammen.

Machiavelli, N. (1998) Fyrsten (The Prince), Grøndahl Dreyer, Gjøvik.

Parsons, T. (1966) "Evolutionary Universals in Society", American Sociological Review

29(3).

Rasch, B. E. (2000) Demokrati. Ideer og Organisering (Democracy. Ideas and Organisation),

Fagbokforlaget, Bergen.

Waage, P. N. (1984) "Fjodor Mikhailovitsj Dostojevskij", Arken, 7(4).

20

Weber, M. (1990) Makt og Byråkrati. Essays om Politikk og Klasse, Samfunnsforskning og

Verdier (Power and Bureaucracy. Essays on Politics and Class, Social Science and

Values), Gyldendals Fakkelbøker, Oslo.

21